Teaching Beyond Technique

Here is the official statement released by concerned faculty, in support of our two Math 5 colleagues.

We, the faculty members of the Philippine Science High School – Main Campus, express our full confidence in the competence and integrity of our fellow teachers, Ms. Dinah Lizza M. Gutierrez and Mr. Jose Manresa Enrico D. Español IV in the midst of unfounded denigrations, unfair criticisms, and unnecessary threats that are currently circulating through the Internet.

We stand as a community of responsible academicians and responsive citizens who recognize the two teachers’ capability and proficiency in the same way that we uphold the Pisay tradition of “kahusayan ng isip” and “kagalingan ng puso” which are expected to be lived out by each science scholar whose passion to effect meaningful change is continuously fuelled by taxpayers’ money despite the ongoing economic crisis.

Words are insufficient to concretize our collective sentiments emanating from a disabling form of woundedness brought about by misguided thoughts and inappropriate statements that challenge the very integrity of these two teachers. Parker J. Palmer (1998), author of the phenomenal book The Courage To Teach succinctly explains why humiliating and distrusting any teacher in whatever form is divisive, destructive, and ultimately, debilitating:

Teaching and learning are critical to our individual and collective survival and to the quality of our lives. The pace of change has us snarled in complexities, confusions and conflicts that will diminish us, or do us in, if we do not enlarge our capacity to teach and learn. At the same time, teacher-bashing has become a popular sport. Panic-stricken by the demands of our day, we need scapegoats for the problems we cannot solve and the sins we cannot bear.

Teachers make an easy target, for they are such common species and so powerless to strike back. We blame teachers for being unable to cure social ills that no one knows how to treat; we insist that they constantly adopt whatever “solution” has most recently been concocted by our national panacea machine; and in the process, we demoralize, even paralyze, the very teachers who could help us find our way.

In our rush to reform education, we have forgotten a simple truth: reform will never be achieved by renewing appropriations, restructuring schools, rewriting curricula, and revising texts if we continue to demean and dishearten the human resource called the teacher on whom so much depends. Teachers must be better compensated, freed from bureaucratic harassment, given a role in academic governance, and provided with the best possible methods and materials. But none of that will transform education if we fail to cherish – and challenge – the human heart that is the source of good teaching.

Ms. Gutierrez and Mr. Español, like any other Pisay teacher, became teachers for reasons of the heart, driven by a passion to unleash our students’ potentials through our subjects so they may better be equipped to help others in the end. Aspiring to be or to act like gods in our classrooms is alien to our repertoire of reasons why we are intent about being with our students essentially more than five days a week. We see in our students very promising scholars who deserve not to be tortured but to be nurtured, for in them, we see the fulfilment of our collective dreams geared towards social transformation anchored on a clear understanding of their self-worth. Every moment we spend planning and carrying out instruction that will help our students grow is anchored on principles of mentoring, not tormenting. We believe that by providing them meaningful challenges that are the result of our long years of professional training, we will be able to ignite in our students the power to search for the truth and to use it to lead better lives. We simply cannot afford to let them miss the chance to be comfortable with challenges – precisely because we know they are a cut above the rest.

Teaching remains to be a science but we have gone beyond techniques in teaching and have always been compassionate in the same way we believe that excellence should always bear a soul. In the end, we remain to be faithful servants of the iskolar ng bayan.

CONCERNED PSHS-MAIN CAMPUS FACULTY

A Matter of Facts: My Statement on Batch ’09

Graduation Day nears and the shape of things to come is becoming more clear. Besides my defense of my colleagues, I have yet to write about the other matters that have been tainting the final days of Batch 2009. They don’t deserve this. Today, I’d like to make it very clear where I stand.

I

Batch 2009 is a good batch. They themselves say that they aren’t the best. Sure, they were a little tough to teach back then. They didn’t read their books as well as I wanted. A handful of students consistently failed to submit requirements. I had to curve some of their tests too.

But I will always remember them for Pisay Meets World. There was TXV too. They are undoubtedly the most creative batch of SS2 students I’ve ever handled. They have the best writers, artists, and performers. I had to invent the A++ in grading their work. I had to keep raising the bar for them creatively for they made me — as eccentric as I could be — feel inadequate. When I design projects these days, I see that the bar of creativity has been set by Batch 2009 and it’s a bar I don’t see being topped anytime soon.

II

They are good kids. My last advisory class was Camia 2009. I was never supposed to be their adviser but I substituted until a new teacher came in for them. But I didn’t let go. They didn’t let me go. I was already teaching six socsci classes (a full load), but I willingly took on the extra load. I wanted to. Camia ’09 was a very fun class. They may not have won contests, but they didn’t have to do much else to win me over.

As a matter of fact, I would have done the same for my other five sections.

And when I think of outstanding individuals, I can’t deny that Batch 2009 gave me a very good AKSIS President. Great things happened with AKSIS in the past year because of Criselle David, and I believe that she — and every other Batch 2009 student who worked hard — deserve to enjoy their day in the sun (unfortunately literally). Because of people like Criselle (and there are many), Batch 2009 deserves their graduation.

III

As a faculty, I am disappointed with the decision of the BOT to reconsider the students who failed more than 1/3 of their academic units. I believe that this seriously harms the standards of the Philippine Science High School.

Over lunch today, I posed this question to my colleagues: How do we teach the next batch of 4th year students?

How can we teach them when they now know that they can get away with failing more than 1/3 of their subjects? How can we motivate them to do better when they know they can get away with so much less?

None of us could answer. We’re still scratching our heads. And that scares me.

IV

In addition, I believe that the principal suspects in Discipline Case 14 deserve nothing less than a termination of their scholarship. Their act is scandalous. And considering we are a government institution, allowing these students to eventually graduate is a betrayal of the public trust.

Nonetheless, I understand why the school feels unable to persecute these two individuals. We have a very weak definition of excellence. Somewhere along the way, we have lost track of our vision and mission. We are confused about what “Iskolar ng Bayan” means, entitling ourselves to its benefits but none of its responsibilities.

The real tragedy is that the system is broken. The powers that be don’t play by their own rules, and we teachers are not given the tools (ie. material, legal, ideological) we need to carry out our tasks into its utmost completion. Hence we are constrained to teach for the sake of teaching, and those who try to do more simply die trying.

It is a tragedy that in trying to do what is right, we see how little is actually left.

V

I sympathize with those who won’t graduate and with those who people say shouldn’t graduate.

To the former, know that you still have your whole life ahead of you. I may have never gotten a 5.00, but I know what it feels like to anticipate and hope for something great only for it to be denied at the last moment. I too have failed greatly. But once the strong feelings have subsided, take some time to be honest with yourself and see what you could do better. You are still young and the possibilities are endless. Realize that there are so many who are ready to support you — count me in — so never give up.

To the latter — especially those who were reconsidered — I don’t think you deserve to be hated and renounced by anyone. You are victims of the system too. The joke is on you. They should have just decided to play by the rules and showed you the door, but instead they — in all good intentions — threw you to the wolves. I think ire should be directed at the BOT, not you.

Nonetheless you, of all people, should know whether you deserve to graduate or not. I hope you take the time to decide whether you will march alongside your batchmates, for only you can tell all of us what kind of people you really are. It is never too late to be good again.

VII

I will attend the Graduation Day of Batch 2009. I will be happy for my students, I will congratulate their parents, and I will be glad for me — for I have worked on these students too.

It’s sad to know that I won’t see all of them graduate, but I could be sadder still. For we all know we deserve better, and yet I trust my students to do the right thing for they are good kids — and Batch 2009 is a good batch.

The Most Important Video for the 21st Century

For us educators, something to share — Did You Know?

Learn more about this presentation in its wiki, Shift Happens.

Get your facts straight on Pisay issues!

Download this fact sheet for an overview of the different issues affecting our school today. May this explain all the leaked e-mails, the online petitions, and the conflicting information you may or may not be hearing. May this fact sheet give all of us some clarity. Get them straight.

DOWNLOAD THE FACT SHEET

Samson Writes “I Cannot Sit By Idly”

Michael Daniel Samson, a PSHS alumnus and former Math teacher in the PSHS, has written a very sincere and thoughtful piece on the issues that currently surround us. He could no longer sit idly by, and I can’t simply not redirect everyone to read his piece which is probably the best that has come out of all this.

Some highlights:

Nobody really thinks about how teachers are affected by this. Nobody I have worked with has been blase about failing students; nobody I have worked with has doled out failing marks with malicious approbation, or with even the smallest bit of levity. Each time that I had failed a student, first-year, second-year, fourth-year students, I had to worry about what I had not done, because I was, with the help of other faculty, already trying to do as much as I can at that point. You can always doubt yourself, which is why these accusations are so damning—every teacher has a bit of him or her that is taking that tack from within.

Questioning these grades now holds not just the system, but the integrity of all involved, under the same interrogation: these two teachers, who have been labelled as incompetent and malicious, are implicitly backed up by the entirety of the faculty body, to each one. To label them such is to cast a net on all of us who have worked with them, who have been helped by them, and to all who have had the privilege of their tutelage, whether student or co-worker. I, for one, owe them, and by extension, so do all of my students.

Please read the entire article here.

On Pisay, Sir Arghs writes “This is Africa, Too”

In his blog, Sir Arghs gives his literary take on the battles he fought over the past two weeks — battles which teachers here have been fighting for even when we were still in high school.

Allow me to share some highlights.

I’m just ending my fourth year in Pisay. And even during my first year, I knew that something was wrong with the best high school in the land. Actually, two things: TRANSPARENCY AND CONSISTENCY. Teachers are often asked to sit down in discipline and scholarship committees and they are supposed to implement the school’s rules in these discussions. But teachers only have recommendatory powers, what we suggest is not always final. But we do most of the legwork, we are with the students most of the time, and you think that our collective experiences would know how best to deal with situations. However, we often find our recommendations being overturned and we aren’t even told why. We simply have to accept these things. As some of the veteran teachers keep telling us, it has been this way ever since.

Turns out, we were fighting a system which rewards both good work and bad behaviour. Hell, it even rewards bad work, if you could believe that. And the bottom line? I really don’t know. Perhaps, in this empowered age, schools have become more timid regarding lawyers and their suits. Schools have made a devil’s bargain these days, not wanting to face the courts and instead taking the easy way out, even if they are right. Never mind if it means negating all the values that their teachers try to impart to the students. Never mind that by turning a blind eye, they are allowing “monsters” to graduate as the press declared during the height of the school’s poisoning case. Never mind that their teachers are being disrespected not only by their students but also by the parents of some students. Never mind if everyone in school loses his or her credibility. Never mind if the heart and soul and mind of a school are relegated to the sidelines and made to watch the body die of cancer. Those things are more convenient than facing a lawsuit.

That’s the defining thing in this age: Convenience.

His piece is also a commentary on Idealism. This bit has something for all of us to think about.

Idealism is a tricky thing. It seems it was invented to make us realists. Yet realists are routinely bashed for not being idealistic enough. Idealism is like the ocean. It is vast, two-thirds of the earth’s surface and yet like the crashing of the waves against the beach, it doesn’t have a clear form – and anything formless immediately strikes fear into our hearts. We try to contain it; we try to limit its influence. Then, we ignore it until it simply becomes part of the scenery – nice to look at, but not really what we want for ourselves.

Read his entire piece here and leave a comment or two. He will appreciate your comments.

A Question for the Board of Trustees

Thinking out loud here. Essentially, the problem is this. So you allowed several students who failed the 1/3 rule to graduate. Alright. So how do I explain this to my [second year] students who are getting kicked out because they violated the 1/3 rule?

That is — if you are you still kicking them out?

So do I want to stay on as Batch Adviser?

I am flattered by an agreement struck by the incoming Batch 2011 Council. They want me to stay on as Batch Adviser and have even started a little survey to get a feel of whether the rest want it too.

But what do I think?

Quick answer: Yes. I would love to stay on as 2011 Batch Adviser.

Long answer: The past school year, even with all the disappointment in the last two weeks, is the most fulfilling school year I’ve ever had. Working as the Batch Adviser is one of my favorite work experiences so far. If only for the chance to work with our students and parents again, please sign me up!

In some ways, my work with the Batch is undone. We’ve established really good working relationships over the past year and I am excited to build on this foundation for activities such as the retreat and the prom. The mentor in me wants to pursue career talks that won’t just inform students of opportunities, but equip them with the skills to create their own opportunities. I plan to invite not just scientists but artists — the ones who create videogames, digital films, and sound recordings. There is science in all that too!

My philosophy about the Third Year is that it is the time when you begin thinking about the choices you will have to make in the 4th year and beyond. You don’t have to make them yet, but you should at least realize that you need to. The theme of the year will be responsibility, and this will be in preparation for the time you make your commitments in 4th year.

In being aware of choices we also talk about relationships, whether it be with friends, frenemies, or those who are more than friends. The people we keep close to us help define our future successes, so we need to be made further aware of our responsibilities to others, especially those who are dear to us. This is why we have the retreat. This is also why we have the prom.

I can go on and on.

The “But”: However, not being able to work together again will be fine too. In some ways, my work with the Batch is done. We have done so much, Batch 2011. We’ve made the most out of all the opportunities given to us, and I have no regrets. Not a single one. Even when we were told we couldn’t, we found a way to make things happen for ourselves. We are lucky to have all the support we do, so I am confident that even without me, you will be fine.

We have all the reason to believe that your next Batch Adviser may even do a better job than me. You’ll never know. And in the event that he or she doesn’t, then you will be there. Your parents will be there. I am confident in all of you. I am thankful if you believed in my power to make a difference, but that will mean nothing if along the way, you didn’t learn to believe in your own power too.

Therefore: Whatever happens next, I will be happy. If we continue to work together, then that is most excellent. If not, then that will be just as good too. I will be fine. You have nothing to worry about with me.

Yet, just as it has always been in the past year, it doesn’t matter what I think. It matters more what you think, what you want. So if you ask me if I want to, it’s a clear yes. But this isn’t just my decision to make.

For me to be your Batch Adviser in Third Year, I will have to teach SS3. I can do that and I’m actually itching to teach something different next year. But right now, I am giving way to my colleagues who feel more confident teaching SS3. They can always be convinced, but they need to hear it from people other than me.

And as for the Admin, we mended fences today and will bear no ill feelings towards each other moving forward. I made it clear to them that if they need a Batch Adviser, I will be there. And they advised me that if I wish to follow my Batch, then I will have to teach SS3.

It’s your move guys.

In direct response to the PTA

Here is the full text of my e-mail to Mr. Mon Castillo, Batch 2009 President –

Dear Mr. Castillo,

This is Martin Perez, a social science teacher in the PSHS. We met once before during a PTA Executive Council meeting at Deli France, Libis. I am also the Batch Adviser of 2011.

It has come to my attention that the PTA of 2009 has started quite a stir about the two fives in Math 5. I learned so from my former student, Jonathan Isip, who writes in the blog, http://stellarmusings.multiply.com. He is part of this year’s graduating class.

I would just like to bring something urgent to your attention. The messages in the PTA e-group are visible to the public. All your messages and exchanges are currently being read and quoted by students and teachers. All your messages are being tracked and recorded.

I mention this because I don’t know if this is intentional on your part. Some of the parents may feel that they are part of a private conversation (since e-mail is a private medium by default), and may not know that what they say, think, and feel are already being broadcast across the Internet. The messages can be read so completely and fully that students can reconstruct whole discussions and attribute comments to specific people.

Opinion about the PTA is already forming among students and teachers. Generally, a majority of the community feels that a lot of your arguments and judgments are formed on the lofty basis of hearsay, and that your actions may endanger the good work that a lot of teachers are trying to do. For instance, your having the test inspected can set a dangerous precedent for other parents to inspect the exams in other subjects too. This is unfair for all those teachers who have invested time and expertise in crafting their own tests and curricula. Your current position betrays a false sense of distrust in the system. There is now a real danger to generalize that all teachers are incompetent (which is what Tony Guerrero is now saying) which is blatantly unfair to the rest of us. I will be the first to admit that the system is not perfect, but there are a lot of us here who are trying our damnedest best to do a good job.

I apologize if I write to you directly, Mr. Castillo, but I feel that this must be brought to your attention before this all gets blown out of proportion. Apparently, you only protest the teachers of Math 5, but here I am, a second year social science teacher, writing you. We feel that the sentiments of PTA, if left unchecked, may lead down a very dangerous road. So do we just threaten teachers with court orders whenever there is an unfavourable outcome? We have to draw the line somewhere, Sir.

We are not escaping accountability of course. I am currently one of the younger faculty hungry for change. I too am pressing for the system to be more efficient and transparent. But as someone concerned for the betterment of Pisay just like you, I recommend that you course your discussions through more constructive channels now. Speak with the Math teachers directly and clarify what have been reported to you. Instead of bringing the exams to professors in UP and Ateneo, discuss how these exams truly test the knowledge of the students with the teachers who actually teach them. The teachers in question are products of Pisay too. They, of all people, should know what they are doing.

Because unless you engage the system directly, you will be left speculating and guessing. As you do so, you fan the passions of other parents who may have a misinformed opinion about what’s going on. This is very irresponsible, I think, and we wouldn’t want this exchange to taint our upcoming graduation ceremonies.

I know that you want only what’s best for our school. I agree that as an alumnus, you have a stake in our school doing well. You are welcome to help us do our job better, but do so constructively. The messages in the e-group, exposed as they are in the public, only ferment ill will on both sides. I suggest you begin by making them private to your group only. Then, engage the teachers you need to. What you intend to do and say have already reached them. It would be best that you clear the air with them too.

Thank you very much for your time. I wish you all the best and I thank you for all your contributions to our community.

Sincerely,
Martin Perez

We teachers don’t play dice

A lot of things have been happening in this school that merit an expose or two. Yet I have refrained from making my remarks public for I wouldn’t want to jeopardize the efforts of some people who want to restore a sense of reason and proportion to the system. I also wouldn’t want to jeopardize the chances of me continuing to work with my students. With everything that has gone on, I conclude that I answer only to them. Hence, it is for them that I too need some sense of reason and proportion.

But rest assured, the battles that have to be fought are being fought. When it comes to the point when we have to bring out the heavy artillery, you will read about it here.

However, something new has been brought to my attention. And given that it broke out in the Internet first, I feel some sense of obligation to respond to it. At the least, I too cannot allow this slander — not the blog’s but of what it references — to pass without remark.

In his blog, a former student delivers a passionate riposte to an accusation hurled by some parents to the teachers of Math 5. The accusations are as follows:

What happened to our students in Math is not a reflection of poor student performance but rather teachers’ performance bordering on the incompetence. Knowing that the 50% of the students already have failing grade in the third quarter. Why would a teacher in his/her right mind give an exam that only 10% of the students would pass? Maybe the teachers are not in their right mind. Because of a very low passing rate, The Math Department then recalculated the weights of the grades. The final exam was given a weight of 7% instead of 30%, The NAT was given a weight of 22% etc.. The funny thing is that they had the power to recompute the grades and yet, they did not give everybody an opportunity to take the removal exam ! They acted like gods deciding on the fate of some students and decided that two of our poor students do not deserve the opportunity of a removal exam, instead the 2 students were given an outright grade of 5. They made a conscious decision to destroy the future of this 2 kids.

If there are any parents out there specially lawyers, who feels as strongly as how i feel about this grave injustice, please contact me privately, I need to consult you. The culture of the teachers in PSHS is changing. Some teachers no longer believe in norturing the students. Many are now starting to have this devil may care attitude. I pity the next batches of students who will be under them. These teachers have to be stop. Expelled from the school by court order if necessary.

I am expected to run to my colleagues’ defense. But before I do so, some disclaimers are in order: I do not know this parent. I do not know the students involved. I have not seen these math teachers in action and thus in defending them I will depend on testimonies from their students which — to be quite frank — are the only testimonies that really matter.

I am compelled to comment for I am a teacher in the school in question. There are principles at stake here and this parent’s comments — once acted upon — have dire implications for me as well.

I teach social studies in the 2nd year. My failing a student may not be as damning as failing them in their fourth year and yet, even we at the 2nd year level don’t fail our students recklessly. We know our responsibilities, and I can only imagine the heavier responsibilities that 4th year teachers have since students are on the verge of graduation.

Thus, this entry is a comment on the very idea that students failing is a consequence of our incompetence and that because of this, we have no place in this school.

I agree with the second premise. To continue nurturing the best of the best, we teachers have to be no less than the best too. That makes perfect, irrefutable sense.

However, I do not fully agree with the first premise. Indeed, student failure can be a reflection of teacher performance, but student failure is first and foremost a reflection of student performance. We teachers are not gods who determine who lives or dies. We don’t play dice. When it comes to grades, we are mirrors; we only give back what we get. It is hard for us to fail students, yet once we’ve done everything in our power to help them and yet they fail to help themselves, then failing them is the responsible thing to do.

The parent actually acknowledges how the Math teachers did everything they could to buoy their failing students. Historically, Math 5 has always been a difficult subject. Their efforts to adjust their scale so that their students can pass is a matter of public record and stated in every scholarship meeting. They cannot be accused of being soulless tormentors for they have cast aside the cold hard truth of numbers in order to pass as many students as they can. If they were soulless, a hundred plus would not be graduating now.

Though I may not completely agree with the philosophy of failing (I rather that my students feel themselves succeed), I am open to thinking that this philosophy may work better in Math than it does in the Humanities. I have been a Math student too, and I agree that Math isn’t for everyone. Yet failing in Math is viable and clear for there are very particular skills one must learn. Failure becomes either an impetus to do better or a signal that Math just isn’t for you. Either way, students have benefited from this. Those who move on to pursue higher Math in college eventually appreciate the rigor in which their high school Math was taught.

On the other hand, the Humanities is a little more open ended. While there are also content to be known and skills to be mastered, measuring student success is not as rigid or deadly precise as that in the hard sciences. We reward participation, insight, and hard work. Students who have failed in my class do so not because they can’t recall some obscure historical detail, but because, more often than not, they failed to perform or submit a class requirement.

But I am sure that the Math teachers can say the same thing. They reward participation, insight, and hard work too. All teachers agree with this, and thus I express my utmost confidence that my colleagues have done all they can within reason to help their students. As Jonathan himself said,

One thing is certain, the two Math teachers being insulted by this parent know what they are doing, they are good people and excellent teachers. I am proud to have been taught by them and consider them part of the best teachers and people who have affected my life.

Perhaps, in the eyes of some students, these teachers are impossible. That can be said of any teacher. But incompetent? Hardly. They are among the best and the brightest the school has produced (they are alumni) and have yet to offer. Sure, students failed under their watch, but they’ve also produced winners in contests and Olympiads here and abroad. That may not be the most complete measure of success, but it is not an indicator of failure either.

The parent’s emotional tirade is understandable. Moreover, I personally believe that it is the parent’s place to oversee how their child is being taught. Nonetheless, enrolling your child in our institution requires some measure of trust. By sending your child to Philippine Science, you trust us to do our job. You trust us to adhere to the high standards of the school. You trust us to make your child even better.

You can question whether we do so or not, but be prepared to face the facts. If we are truly found wanting, then put us to task. But if the student is found wanting, then put the student to task. So part of you trusting us is acknowledging that perhaps, your child just did not make it.

To express rage and anger at the child’s failure is understandable. Now all those college plans will be back in the drawing board. But to quickly label the teachers as incompetent and to threaten their termination is rather out of line. It belittles the fact that they have done good work. The comments in Jonathan’s post show that there are students who will defend these teachers. Thus, they must have done something right.

Perhaps, what this parent fails to realize is that his or her child is not the rule. Only two — out of a Batch of more than two hundred — are getting a five in math. The only obvious question to ask after all this is really: What did the student fail to do?

Because what a failing grade says is that the student isn’t ready to move on, and there is much more to lose in the future if a student fails to do well now.